Intelligent Remotes, Shared Displays Kick Off IDF

Imagine a scenario where a room interprets your face and gestures, and then translated your words into data. Sound far-fetched? Then how about just a TV remote control that senses who you are? Intel described these and more at its kickoff event for the Intel Developer Forum (IDF).

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Imagine a scenario where a room reacts to you, interpreting your face and gestures to learn about identity and mood, and translating your words into data. Sound far-fetched? Then how about just a TV remote control that senses who you are?

Intel kicked off its Intel Developer Forum with an overview of its research initiatives, shifting back and forth between blue-sky concepts, such as a PC simply "understanding" the user, with how to break down the problem into smaller, solvable problems.

In some sense, Intel has never been an arbiter of social change  boiled down to its essence, the company makes chips. Applications developers, such as Microsoft, shape computing experiences, and use Intel's hardware as compute engines.

(For a more in-depth examination of Intel's research projects, see the accompanying slideshow.)

But Intel has never been quite satisfied with that role, and company researchers have set out to create a roadmap to developing those applications, with small, stepping-stone-like research projects. Mary Smiley, director of the Emerging Platforms Lab, characterized it this way: what to sense? How to sense it? How to do the sense making, or coordinate sensors into a type of sensory experience? And finally, how to protect privacy, and present the results?

Intel presented two programs the company is using as guidelines: Connected Visual Computing, which uses massively multiplayer online games as a model, and "Carry Small, Live Large," a mantra that says that mobile computing should be able to take advantage of other objects, such as displays or storage, in its immediate proximity.

MMORPGs attract Intel for the simple reason that they require correspondingly massive amount of compute power: roughly 70 percent CPU utilization (versus 20 percent for a 2D Web site) and between 35 to75 percent of a GPU. Network bandwidth, naturally, is often saturated. But layering data on top of real-life applications (such as location-based services and on-the-fly translation) also requires computing resources, and is increasingly attracting Intel's research dollar, explained Jim Held, an Intel fellow.

Examples of these applications include content-creation applications like automated face modeling, where a database of 3D face representations are deformed on the fly through sliders marked "fullness," "flatness," "shape," and "chin," according to Andrew Chien, vice president of the corporate technology group.

One of Intel's most auspicious projects is its so-called "90 percent accuracy for 90 percent of your day," a rather awkwardly named project that aims at a PC that simply knows what it is a user is trying to do. Twelve dedicated Intel researchers, plus collaborative projects at an additional fourteen or so universities all are working on individual projects ranging from machine learning to imaging, to computer-human interfaces, all with the intent to help computers become aware of everyday activities.

An example of that is "egocentric video," Chien said, where a shoulder-mounted camera is asked to identify objects that a user can interact with under a variety of lighting conditions. Only seven objects can currently be identified under 70 to 95 percent of lighting and usage conditions; obviously, the project can almost infinitely scale to other objects and conditions, he said.

Finally, Chien identified a somewhat more practical idea: identifying who is holding trhe remote control simply by measuring the patterns of who is using it. In a study with five families, Intel was able to tell which family member was holding the remote just by placing an accelerometer in the remote, and measuring data such as the frequency and force of key presses. About 85 percent accuracy was achieved, Chien said. Logitech has also talked about using biometrics inside remotes to identify users.

Intel's Smiley capped off the presentation by describing the "Carry Small, Live Large" philosophy, which argues that users will carry the smallest physical compute platrom they can, while still asking it to perform the most functions possible. Most of the related demonstrations, involving the use of remote displays and other resources, were explained in the demo showcase next door. (See slideshow.)

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